Wednesday, 11 March 2015

A Fist in the Face of God presents... Full Speed Ahead Vol II - A Mix by Hades & Fenriz

Artwork by Jan Utecht

After the relative success of last year's Full Speed Ahead speed metal compilation, its composer—Hades Omega of Greek speed metal outfit Omega—informed me of a follow-up, this time brining more of the proto-speed metal sounds that set the sub-genre in motion for the early to mid-80s. This time he enlisted the skills of one DJ Fenriz, who picked out almost half of the tracks on this second volume of heart-pounding ripping metal.

Live from Kniven

They actually played the mix out at Oslo's finest metal bar Kniven, last weekend. Oh, and he even had the multi-talented Jan Utecht of German speed/black metal band Occvlta draw up the artwork for the mix. And a fine job he did, too. A real group effort, nice one.

I asked the guys if they had anything to say about their selection and Fenriz started by adding:

yeah, it's dopi from machetazo that sent me a whole bunch of old spanish metal from the 80s and i picked out my faves from that and put on this comp, atleast 4 spanish tracks i think. when i heard the whole comp i quickly deducted that the black magic track ruled the whole comp, btw.

Before Hades weighed in with:

Since last year's compilation went pretty good and many people got into it, i thought it's time for a second speed metal attack! This time though, i was thinking about asking my friend and music trader Fenriz (Darkthrone), since he is the BIGGEST speed metal maniac i know, to join me and choose together the tracks. We even decided presenting the compilation LIVE at Kniven bar (Oslo), while hitting a few beers! I really like how it turned out, cuz there are many obscurities and interesting releases to dig from old and even new bands!! So i hope people will enjoy it , as much as we did!